


Lacrimis Morientium

by ohinyan



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Character Death, Disturbing Themes, M/M, Mpreg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-16
Updated: 2012-10-17
Packaged: 2017-11-12 06:54:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/487963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohinyan/pseuds/ohinyan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor has abandoned Jack on Satellite 5. This has consequences that he did not foresee. Major Jack angst. A dark fic. AU after Parting of the Ways.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Mpreg. Dark and depressing. Character death and very disturbing scenes. May be triggering for anyone with issues relating to infants. No happy ending. 
> 
> Genre: Angst, AU after Parting of The Ways
> 
> Spoilers: Parting of the Ways

Jack gazed in horror and disbelief as the TARDIS vanished before his eyes. He gasped and fell to his knees in shock. He stayed there a long time, still dizzy and weak from whatever had happened when the Dalek failed to kill him. In truth he was not just waiting for that weakness to pass, or the shock to subside, he was waiting for the TARDIS to reappear. It did not. 

  


Hours later, Jack got to his feet. His knees protested angrily at being moved after so long, and he staggered. He was numb, emotionally and physically. He walked slowly through the room, picking his way through the spaghetti wiring that filled the aisle. He checked the delta wave machine. It was complete, but had not been activated. How could that be? His volunteers had given their lives to allow the Doctor time to complete it, which he had obviously done. So why wasn't it used? And since it hadn't been used, what had happened to the Daleks? It didn't make any sense. He couldn't leave it like this, though. It would only take one push on a lever to activate it, and wipe out all life within range. He quickly disconnected some wires, disabling the machine. 

  


Pushing his feelings of hurt and confusion aside, Jack moved into time agent mode. His commanding officer may have done a bunk, but he was a trained soldier, it was time he acted like one. First assess the viability of the environment and send a distress signal, then check for survivors. He moved over to the computer bank and called up the station stats. Levels 496 and 497, where Lynda had been stationed, were leaking air so he sealed them off. On those levels, loud klaxons sounded, giving anyone present two minutes warning to leave the level. Power levels were low throughout the station, but would last several days before something needed to be done. For the moment he could concentrate on the hunt for survivors. 

  


* * * * * 

 

Two hours later, Jack had checked the six levels that he and his volunteers had tried to defend. He had found the bodies of his fellow defenders, and a few stragglers who had missed the evacuation, but no one living. He arranged the bodies on one level and sealed it off, bowing his head in respect. These had been his comrades, and they were all accounted for except for Lynda. Her section of the Satellite had been breached from the outside, and she would have been blown out into space. There was nothing he could do to recover her body. 

  


Knowing that there had been 100 people on level zero, he had checked there next. Bodies lay strewn around the room, some in piles as they had tried to hide behind each other. There were no survivors. He felt no compunction to treat these people with any respect, so he merely left them where they lay and sealed the door. 

  


By this point he was exhausted. He had had no rest since he, Rose, and the Doctor had first landed on the Satellite. He decided to give up his search for the night, and sleep. He went up to level 101, one of the Big Brother levels, chose a flat, ate some food from the kitchen, and dropped into the nearest bed. He was asleep within seconds. 

  


* * * * * 

 

The next day, Jack rose, ate, and carried on his search. He covered 36 levels that day. Still no survivors. 

  


For the next four days Jack searched and slept. He found no one. And nor did he hear the sound he longed for. The sound of the TARDIS materialising. He had left a message in the control room on level 500, explaining what he was doing, so that the Doctor would be able to find him when they returned.

  


By the 6 th day, Jack had searched every level. It was now horribly clear that he was alone on the satellite; the only survivor. 

  


* * * * * 

 

Jack had been driving himself hard since the TARDIS left. He had thrown himself into the work, partly to avoid thinking. But he could avoid it no longer. He returned to the place where he had last seen the TARDIS; his home. Gazing at the empty place, where the TARDIS had once stood, grief welled up in him. “Where are you Doctor? Why did you leave me?” he asked the air. “Did I do something wrong?”

  


Jack thought back over the months prior to their arrival on Satellite 5. After a rocky start to his time on the TARIS, a month after the Doctor and Rose rescued him from his doomed ship he and the Doctor had become lovers. For someone like Jack, who had not had a home since his early childhood, it was a revelation. The Doctor made him feel wanted, and that he belonged. Rose was like a sister to him. For the first time in his adult life he had felt part of a family. Which made the Doctor's abandonment totally incomprehensible to him. And the most painful episode in his life, not excluding Gray.

  


They had not argued, nor was Jack aware of any way in which he had hurt or upset the Doctor. And even if he had, surely the Doctor would have talked to him. He would not have deliberately abandoned him. No, he would be back. There must have been an emergency. The Doctor would sort it, and come back for him. He just needed to be patient. 

  


Having calmed himself down, Jack decided to create a living space right there in the control room. This was probably the first place that the Doctor would look when he came back. He headed off to the Big Brother level to forage for supplies. 

  


By the time he needed to sleep again, Jack had a bed made up on the floor at the far end of the aisle from where the TARDIS had been. The pallet was well padded with blankets. He had a stack of drinks, canned and bottled, including some wine, plus a large mound of non perishable food. He celebrated his new accommodations by drinking one of the bottles of wine. “Hurry up Doctor,” he called out. “The wine's lousy.”

 

  


* * * * * 

  
  


After ten more days of waiting, Jack finally came to the realisation that he needed to get off the Satellite, before it became uninhabitable. He would have to give up on waiting for the Doctor. It was a difficult decision. For three days, he put it off. He had set the coordinates on his vortex manipulator for 20th century Earth. Every time his hand hovered over the controls he would convince himself that the Doctor would arrive at any moment. But he did not, and eventually Jack pressed the button.

  


Nothing happened. 

  


Jack stared at his wrist strap in shock. He tried again. Still nothing. Trying not to panic, he went down two levels to a storage section, where there were tool kits intended for using with computers. They were a bit large for using on his wrist strap, but he could make do. He found a table where he could work, and opened up the inner workings of the manipulator. His heart sank. The main components, that enabled time travel and teleportation, were burnt out. And there was no way that they could be fixed. The Dalek blast had obviously done more lasting damage to the manipulator, than it did to him. 

  


And, suddenly, everything was different. He had spent the three weeks since the Doctor abandoned him in the certain belief that he could leave at any time he wanted. He had been devastated, yes, heartbroken, yes, but he had not been in fear of dying. He was now.

  


* * * * * 

  
  


Two weeks later Jack had done all the repairs to the Satellite's power systems that he could. He had shut down all non-essential systems, but even so there would be failures within weeks. But the Doctor would be back by then, wouldn't he? And perhaps the Earth government would send up someone to look for survivors before that. He was surprised that they hadn't done so immediately, particularly when they picked up the distress signal.

  


The evacuation of the Satellite had used every shuttle that had been docked. There were none left. He had thoroughly checked the Satellite transmat systems, but they were in no better condition than his vortex manipulator. The main transmat mechanism had been directly hit by a Dalek shot. There would be no way off the Satellite using that. Sighing heavily he headed down to the lower levels to replenish his supplies. 

  


* * * * 

  
  


It was just over one month after the Doctor left, that Jack became ill. He started throwing up violently several times a day. There seemed to be no reason for it. He was not drinking contaminated water, or eating dodgy food. Nothing had changed with his supplies. He considered if it could be radiation poisoning, but all his checks of the radiation detectors showed no excessive levels. If it had been due to handling the bodies, something should have shown up weeks before. 

  


Jack's illness continued for another week before he worked out what was going on. And, when he did, he simply stood frozen in horror as the awful truth sank in. In desperation he ran down to the medical centre and ran a scan. He wasn't wrong. 

  


* * * * * * 

  
  


Pregnant. He was pregnant. And what would normally be a joy was instead a curse. Jack was under no illusions. The power was failing, and Satellite 5 would become uninhabitable within weeks. There would be no heating or cooling, and no recycling of the air. No one had responded to the distress signal. If the Doctor did not come back he was going to die, and with him their baby. 

  


For the next week, Jack worked. He scavenged food and water from the lower levels, bringing everything he could up to the level where he had set up home to wait for the Doctor. Once he had everything that he could use, he cut the power to all but the upper levels. This triggered the emergency lighting on the lower levels, so he rerouted that, making sure that it was disabled on all levels except the one he was using. Cutting the power would buy him another two weeks, he estimated. But that two weeks could make all the difference. The Doctor's timing had never been accurate. 

  


Then, when everything that could be done, was done, he sat and waited. He would try to have faith. The words `Never doubted him, never will.' echoed though his mind. Yeah, right. It was amazing what difference a few weeks could make. 

  


* * * *  
  


Three weeks later, he still waited. Because of the nausea, he ate little, even though there was plenty of food. There was no chance of the food or water running out before the power. 

  


Conditions got worse. The temperature control was failing. The effect depended on whether the satellite was in direct sunlight, or not. Some days Jack was freezing, and huddled under all his blankets. Other days the heat became unbearable. And through all this, Jack thought over and over. “When are you coming back? You wouldn't abandon me, I know you wouldn't.”

  


He was so obsessed with his mantra, that Jack was actually surprised when the air recycling stopped. As it did, the lights went off and were replaced by the dim emergency lighting. He leapt to his feet and moved over to the console. It was dead. The power had completely failed. The only things left were the batteries which powered the emergency lights. They would usually only last a few days, but, since he had disabled all but one of the 500 levels, it would be years before that battery ran down. 

  


His heart was breaking. The Doctor had not come. The man he had believed loved him, had left him to die, and he would never know why. 

  


Jack estimated that there were about two hours of oxygen in the part of the satellite he was in. Two more hours of life, for him and the baby. Jack caressed his stomach tenderly. “I'm so sorry. I've tried everything, but there's nothing more I can do.” Tears fell from his eyes. “I'm sorry that you won't get to live, to grow up, to love and have children. I'm sorry that I'll never meet you. But don't worry, we won't suffer. It'll be just like going to sleep.”

  


He moved over to his pallet and lay down. Nothing to do now but accept the inevitable and sleep.

  


  
  



	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very disturbing scenes.

Jack died of carbon dioxide asphyxiation peacefully, in his sleep, two and a half hours after the recycling failed. Twenty minutes after that, he revived with a desperate gasp. He revived in peak physical condition, his haemoglobin rich in oxygen. 

  


At first Jack thought that they had been rescued. The relief that shot through him was monumental; he and the baby would be OK. Had the Doctor come back, leaving the rescue until the last possible moment? He staggered to his feet and looked around for the TARDIS, but there was no sign of it, or indeed any rescuer. Where were they? He had come round, so someone must have provided oxygen.

 

Jack's relief was short lived. As his body used the oxygen he had revived with, he began to gasp. This was not a slow build up of carbon dioxide, leading to a gentle slide into sleep and death. This was sudden. Jack's body had gone from fully oxygenated, to having no oxygen intake, at the instant he revived. Once the reserves were depleted, it was like drowning in air. He dragged in huge lungfuls of air, but it had no effect. He fell back on the floor, body thrashing involuntarily, hands clawing at his throat, as he tried desperately to get oxygen. He died again, four minutes after reviving. 

  


It took another three deaths for Jack to realise that he was actually dying and reviving. He screamed his agony out to the empty room. Then he remembered the baby. Forgetting his own torment, his thoughts whirled. What is this doing to the baby? Is it already dead, or is it dying and reviving along with me? There was no way to tell. He prayed that it was still alive. 

  


* * * * 

 

Months passed, and no one came. Jack continued to play out the awful cycle of living and dying. The only change was due to his pregnancy. He was showing. So the pregnancy was still ongoing. Jack had no idea why he was reviving from death, and still less idea about how a pregnancy could progress under those circumstances. But progress it did. And, though he did not know it, the usual, gestation time of one year, for a Gallifreyan, was stretching out to six years. In the four minutes of life he had in each cycle, the baby grew. For the twenty minutes he was dead, it did not. 

  


As he grew bigger, Jack's relief that the baby survived with him, turned to ashes. He would never have wanted a child to suffer this agony. It would have been better for it to have died, and stayed dead, the first time. And what would happen, when the time came for the birth? What, as was looking very likely, they had not been rescued by then?

  


* * * * * 

  


  
  


As time went on, Jack prayed for a permanent death for both of them. Anything would be better than this hell. He tried to make it happen. In one of his few functional minutes, he kicked a console to pieces and yanked out a sharp piece of metal. He cut his throat on his next revival, and bled out. He still revived. On one occasion he hung himself, using the wiring for the delta wave machine. That resulted in him being trapped, hanging, as he died and revived, until eventually the wires snapped. In desperation, he tried the delta wave, heedless of the fact that he would have wiped out all life on Earth, if it had worked. He tried four times before his befuddled mind remembered that he had snapped the wiring, and there was no power. In a distant corner of his mind, he was aware that he was no longer rational. 

  


Eventually he gave up trying to end his life, and simply lay where he dropped. Sometime in the fourth year, Jack began to feel the baby move. He imagined he could feel it writhe in agony. 

  


In the fifth year, the baby's Gallifreyan/51st century mind reached out to him. Though his telepathy was weak compared to a Gallifreyan, it was enough for him to be able to detect the contact. The baby was crying, and it broke his heart anew. Despite his own mental breakdown, and physical suffering, Jack projected love and wrapped the fledgling mind in his, giving what comfort he could.

  


Over the months that passed, Jack did his best to reassure the tiny creature, while they both suffered indescribably. His one time love for the Doctor had turned to intense hatred. He took the piece of metal he had once used to kill himself, and used it to cut his wrist. With the blood, he wrote on the wall of the control room, in letters one foot high,

  


Fuck You Doctor

Burn in Hell

  


* * * * 

  


 

Though it was difficult to form any coherent thoughts, as they approached the end of the 5th year Jack began to panic about the birth. He was male, and the only way to give birth was a Caesarian section. He needed a proper medical centre, and surgeons. What he had was a sharp piece of metal. And what would happen to the baby when it was born? Would it still revive, or would it finally succumb to death? He was hopelessly torn. He didn't want the baby to die, nor did he want it to continue to suffer. Could he keep it inside? If he did, what would happen? Would it die? It was an impossible decision, not helped by the very short periods of lucidity that Jack had, between deaths and dying. Eventually he decided that he would not deliver the baby when the time came, but instead keep it inside him. At least he knew that it would revive there. 

  


As the 6th year of their torment began, Jack started to feel the pangs of impending birth. He recognised them from his previous pregnancy. He ignored them for months. The pain he was in increased every time he revived, but still he ignored it. But, eventually, he realised that the baby's mind was becoming weaker at each resurrection. If he continued with his plan, the baby was going to truly die. He now had no choices. 

  


In the few minutes of his next revival, he prepared. He gathered one of his cleanest blankets, to make a nest for the baby next to the pallet. He undressed and lay down, picking up his makeshift knife and holding it to his chest. Next time he would do it. 

  


* * * * * 

  


 

He revived, holding the knife, knowing that he had to act quickly before he died again. He could still feel the baby's mind, though it had faded again. This was going to be crude, but, as long as he got the baby out without hurting it, that's all that mattered. He leaned against the wall so that he could sit partially upright, and see what he was doing. Jack placed the point of the knife on the left side of his swollen stomach, below the main bulge, and pressed in. Not too far, or he would hit the baby. He pulled the knife across, cutting as he went. It was agony, but he persisted, screaming as he did it. It wasn't deep enough! Again, quickly, before he died again and revived healed. 

  


This time it was enough. He put the knife to one side and, grabbing the upper side of the incision, pulled to open up the rip. He nearly passed out with the pain, but held on to consciousness by sheer willpower. Rivers of blood were gushing from the wound. The pallet was soon drenched, and pools were forming around it. He couldn't see the baby through the gore, but he reached in with one hand and felt around. There! He had it. Pulling the baby out, he laid it in the nest, while he grabbed the knife again and cut the umbilical cord. It was done. 

  


Knowing that he had only moments before he asphyxiated again, or bled out, Jack reverently picked the baby up, and cradled it in his arms. He fought down his pain and looked at it, trying to memorise every second. It was a girl. The baby opened her eyes and looked at him. He smiled, as tears fell freely from his eyes. “Hello, gorgeous.” The baby started to cry. Jack gently caressed her with his hand, and with his mind, pouring all his love into her. He kissed her tiny fingers. It wasn't fair that such a tiny, innocent, creature had known such a tormented existence. At the very least he wanted her to know that she was loved.

  


Jack could feel himself slipping away, so he lay down, holding the baby close. When he awoke, she stayed dead. 

  


* * * * * 

  


 

All Jack could do the next three times he revived was pour out his grief in wracking sobs, cradling the tiny body in his arms. As he cried out to the uncaring cosmos, his mind, for so long on the brink of giving way, finally snapped. On his fourth resurrection, he put the baby gently in its nest. He dipped his hand in his blood, which was still wet, and moving over to the wall, started to write. He died where he stood each time, and just carried on writing when he woke, returning to the pallet frequently to replenish the bloody ink. He continued for as many death cycles as it took to cover the walls. The words “Fuck You Doctor Burn in Hell” were now repeated hundreds of times around the room. If he had thought that he hated the Doctor before, the feelings he had for him now transcended hate. He wanted him to suffer, like their daughter had suffered. To feel what she had felt, in her short hellish existence. If the Doctor came to rescue them now, he would kill him.

  


It was two more deaths before he pulled himself together enough to find a bottle of water from his stock. He used it to wash the blood from the baby's skin and hair. Once she was clean, he wrapped her in a sheet with just her face showing, and laid her next to his pallet. He kept her away from the blood. He redressed himself in his black leather trousers and, no longer white, T-shirt.

  


“It's all right now,” he told her, kissing her forehead. “All the hurt is over. There will be no more pain. And you won't be alone, I'll be here with you. I won't abandon you.”

  


He lay down on the blood soaked pallet, next to her, and let his hand rest on her. And there he stayed. 

  


  
  



	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this AU, I assume that, even without Jack, somehow the Doctor ended up at the end of the universe, and things played out very much the same way. I'm assuming everyone is familiar with the episode Utopia. We pick up the story close to the end of the episode.

Malcassairo Year 300 trillion

  


The Doctor and Martha pounded down the corridor towards the control room, where Professor Yana and Chantho were with the TARDIS. The Futurekind were running through the corridors after them. They had a couple of minutes lead, that was all. 

  


Looking in the window of the locked control room door, the Doctor was in time to witness Chantho shoot Professor Yana from her position on the floor. He saw the Professor stagger where he stood, just outside the TARDIS. As the sonic screwdriver was failing to open the door, in desperation, the Doctor reversed it and smashed the barrel into the locking mechanism. The door opened and the Doctor and Martha ran inside. Martha stayed back, trying in vain to close and re-lock the door, while the Doctor went after the Professor. He was just too late. The other Time Lord entered the TARDIS, and locked its doors so the Doctor could not follow him. He scrabbled in vain at the lock, but it would not open for him. 

  


The Doctor backed off, as the energy of regeneration became visible through the TARDIS doors. He turned abruptly, as Martha screamed. “Doctor, they're coming, help me!”

  


The Futurekind were almost upon them, and seeing that Martha couldn't possibly hold the door against them on her own, the Doctor rushed over to help her. As he strained against the door, he heard the TARDIS begin to dematerialise. Screaming, “No!” he was helpless to do anything to stop it. It took four more minutes for the Doctor and Martha to secure the door. By that time the TARDIS was long gone. 

  


“Can you get it back?” Martha cried, in a panic. “How are we going to get out of here without it?”

  


“No, it could be anywhere in time and space by now,” the Doctor replied morosely, as he slumped with his back against the door. “I have no way of recalling it. And no idea how we are going to get out of here,” he admitted. 

  


* * * * 

  


50 years later (in the Master's time line)

  


The Master frowned at the TARDIS console. He had been pulled off course by a rift in spacetime, and the TARDIS had landed right next to it. He checked the coordinates. It was Earth, or at least somewhere in orbit over Earth. But this was Earth after some sort of disaster. The civilisation was at a lower level than he would have expected in the year 200,406. Activating the scanner, he checked what was immediately outside the TARDIS. 

  


It was pitch black, so he activated the external lights on the TARDIS. They illuminated part of a large room, leaving the further areas murky. He was on a derelict satellite. There was no power, and no breathable atmosphere. The TARDIS had landed in what appeared to be a control room. It was a mess. Wiring festooned the centre of the room, there were piles of cans and bottles lying around, some of the consoles had been smashed up, and there was dried blood everywhere. As he moved the scanner around, he found the source of the blood. It was a man, laying on a makeshift pallet that had been soaked in it. Next to him lay a tiny mummified body. 

  


Checking for life signs, and finding none, the Master extended the TARDIS's atmospheric shell out to cover the whole room, and walked out of the door. Intrigued, he gazed at the two bodies. The rift that had brought him here was passing right through them. The scene did not make any sense. Why would they be lying there, in a rift? A rift which was following them, as the satellite orbited. Plus, the baby looked as if it had been dead for centuries, whereas the man looked as if he had only just died. Could the rift possibly have preserved the body of one while letting time take its toll on the other? Unlikely; his time sense did not detect any temporal anomaly that would support that. As the Master scanned the bodies in more detail, he got a major shock. Though the man was human, the baby was part Gallifreyan. 

  


At that moment he saw the graffiti, but the TARDIS lights were not bright enough to illuminate the walls of the room properly. He had to walk over towards the wall to read it. It was written in blood, in letters a foot high. He made a circuit of the room, and found that all four walls were covered in the graffiti. The same message was repeated over and over again. 

  


Fuck you Doctor 

Burn in Hell

 

  


Well, that explained the baby. The human must be from an era when males could bear children. But the question was, how did they come to be here, with such a disparity in their times of death? And why would the Doctor have left his child to die?

  


The Master then got his second major shock in as many minutes. Time writhed, he felt sick and faint. And the dead man gasped and came back to life. 

  


* * * * * 

  


With the man now alive, the Master could feel the vortex energy emanating from him. He stepped back reflexively. It was unnatural, what the Time Lords, if they had survived, would have considered an abomination. At least he now understood why the Doctor would have abandoned the man. But even this would not have caused the Doctor to leave the child. 

  


As the man gasped back into life, he inhaled and, at last, found air to breathe. He thrashed around for a few seconds before his body processed the fact that he was not dying this time. Then he opened his eyes and saw the TARDIS and the Master. Hatred and contempt flashed in his eyes. He practically snarled. And, despite his weakness, he struggled to his feet and launched himself at the Master. He got in a few wild punches that connected with the Time Lord's body. Then his hands clamped round the Master's throat, intent on strangling him. But, even in the best physical condition, a human could not defeat a Time Lord in a hand to hand fight.

  


The Master had been surprised by the ferocity of the human's attack on him, which was the only reason that the man had landed any blows. Once he got over the surprise, he merely peeled the man's hands from his neck and held him away, as he fought and swore and poured out a tirade of hate. 

  


The Master could feel the human's mind through his touch. It was not shielded at all, wide open and projecting. It was a dark, seething, black hole of angush. Bitter hatred, and a burning desire for vengeance, were dominant. Aimed directly at the Doctor. Interesting. 

  


Eventually the man, Jack - the Master had gleaned from his mind, tired, and collapsed to his knees sobbing. He crawled over to the baby and, gently picking her up, stroked the dead face. The contact with the baby seemed to bring him back to something like coherency. “You're too late Doctor. We needed you centuries ago, not now.” His tears ran freely. “Why have you come back?” he asked.

  


“I am not the Doctor,” the Master informed him. 

  


“Of course you are,” snapped Jack. “That's the Doctor's TARDIS, you're a Time Lord. There aren't any others. You may have regenerated, but you can only be the Doctor.” He paused briefly to wipe the tears from his eyes. “So take a hint,” he gestured to the graffiti.

  


The Master was intrigued enough by the situation that he was willing to humour the man, and not merely turn around immediately and abandon him there. “I am a Time Lord, but I stole the Doctor's TARDIS. My name is the Master.” 

  


“You can't expect me to believe that,” Jack retorted. 

  


“Nevertheless, it is true,” the Master insisted. “What happened here? The child is obviously the Doctor's. And how can you be alive?”

  


“I'm sure you know more than I do,” Jack sneered. “You must have done something to make me like this. And only you know why you abandoned us.”

  


Exasperated, the Master put his hand's on either side of the human's head, and opened a door into his own mind. “I am not the Doctor. Look for yourself.”

  


Seeing a chance to hurt the Doctor, Jack stabbed into the Time Lord's mind with as much force as his mind could generate. It had no effect. It was like stabbing cotton wool, there was nothing to push against. 

  


The Master merely held him still and mentally ordered him to look. 

  


Jack eventually did, and, as soon as he did, it was clear that this was not the Doctor. He sagged in the Time Lord's grip. All the fight going out of him, as he understood that this was not his target. 

  


The Master held on to the human, and rifled through his memories. There was no resistance. He had to go back three centuries to arrive at a time where the human's memories were anything other than a morass of pain, anguish and hate, interspersed with dying. Eventually, he found a time before that. The man, Jack, was kissing the Doctor goodbye. He knew that he was going to die, but he was willing to do it, because it was the right thing to do, and because he loved the Doctor. 

  


The Master sneered. Love. He should have known. The Doctor was always into the more sickly sweet, mawkish, emotional stuff than he had been. But he couldn't help the vicarious urge to know what it had been like for the two of them. The presence of a baby left no doubt how close their relationship had been. He went further back through the memories. It didn't take long to find what he was looking for. He got more than he bargained for.

  


* * * * 

  


The Master hadn't expected it, but Jack and the Doctor had made love in the full Gallifreyan way; joining bodies and minds. It had been possible because Jack was from a time when humans had developed limited telepathy. When he delved into those memories, he could feel what both the Doctor and Jack had been feeling. The Master had not felt a Gallifreyan mind so intimately for so long that it was overwhelming. As he traced the memory, the Master became caught up in the Doctor's sensations and desires. And they were focussed on this man. 

  


Before he knew what he was doing, the Master was kissing Jack passionately, his hands leaving Jack's temples to roam over his body. There was no loss of mind to mind contact, as Jack's shields were completely absent, and that meant that any touch was sufficient to allow the telepathic contact.

  


Jack, who had been alone and in agony for centuries, responded eagerly to the Master's touch. He knew now that this was not the Doctor. Not the person he hated with every fibre of his being. And that was all that mattered. He had been starved of contact for so long, that he embraced it fully. Neither of the two men were in conscious control of their actions, but both were desperate for physical closeness. They clawed at each other's clothes frantically, shedding them as quickly as they could, before falling onto the pallet. Neither cared about the dried blood that covered it, nor even the filthy state that Jack was in. 

  


The Master entered Jack quickly, and began thrusting into him, still following the memory of the Doctor. But as he moved a new sensation overtook him. Something that was not present in the memory. He could see, and feel, time lines radiating out from them. They seemed to caress him and wind through his body in a way that, even with all his Time Lord senses, he had never felt before. It was mind blowing. He could see with clarity thousands of possibilities of what could be and what could have been. And they were all centred on Jack. There was also an incredible energy passing between them. It felt as if Jack's body was alive with the vortex, and that was pouring into him as they shagged. With a cry the Master came hard, closely followed by Jack. As they lay together, panting, they both gradually regained their senses. Neither could believe what had just happened.

  


Though stunned by the experience, the Master recovered first. He stood and dragged his clothes back on. He was actually trembling. Then he looked back at Jack, who still lay on the pallet. How could this insane, filthy, human produce such a reaction in him? It was ludicrous. Impossible. 

  


The Master started to walk away, back to the TARDIS. He needed to leave this strange, wrong, man behind. No one should be able to make him lose control like that. When he looked back, he saw that Jack wore an expression of resignation. As the Master watched, Jack turned away and laid his hand gently on the body of the baby. He did not speak. 

  


Having seen Jack's memories, the Master knew that the Doctor had done exactly this. Jack had seen the TARDIS vanish from this very spot, leaving him behind. But what did that matter to him? He wouldn't be influenced by sentiment. He was about to enter the TARDIS, but stopped. Before landing here he had been unutterably bored. And there were too many fascinating mysteries here to be ignored. A rift which followed a satellite, a man, saturated with vortex energy, who could return from the dead, and a Gallifreyan baby, abandoned by her father. How could he just walk away? Plus, if he was honest with himself, he really wanted to repeat the mind blowing sex. 

  


Cursing himself for his uncharacteristic weakness, particularly over a man who was probably even less sane than he was, the Master turned back, held out a hand towards Jack and said “Come.”

  


Jack looked at him blankly for a moment, but then stood up. His 300 year old clothes had not survived the encounter with the Master, so he remained naked. He took one tentative step towards the TARDIS, but then stopped. He looked back at the baby, then at the Master again. “I can't leave her. I promised I wouldn't abandon her.” 

  


The Master was astounded that someone, who was in desperate need of rescue, would jeopardise it for a child who had been dead for centuries. But he understood that this was not negotiable. If he did not allow the baby on board, Jack would stay behind. He nodded curtly and Jack scooped the baby up gently and followed the Master to the TARDIS. 

  


  
  


**AN2: I saw the idea that Jack created the Cardiff rift, while buried for 2000 years, in another story. In that the Doctor and Ianto go back to rescue Jack but the Doctor leaves him there because the rift needed to be created. I would like to acknowledge the author so if anyone can remind me who it was I'd be very grateful. I haven't had any luck finding it with twstoryfinders.**


	4. Chapter 4

  
  


Inside the TARDIS, Jack stood in the console room and watched the Master operate the controls to take them into the vortex. He was numb. He had given up hope of ever getting off the Satellite. For centuries his only waking moments had been taken up with dying. He found that, now, he didn't know what to do. 

 

The Master watched his guest standing just inside the door, holding the baby. He looked as if he wasn't planning to move any time soon. He took a good look in the stark lighting of the console room. The man was a mess. He was coated in grime, and blood that had been there for years. He was in desperate need of a bath. As was he, the Master noted, wrinkling his nose. 

 

“I'm going for a bath,” he announced. “You should as well. You're familiar with the TARDIS, I know. She can show you to a room. And don't get any ideas about trying to commandeer the TARDIS. I've made sure that no one but me can control her.” He then disappeared into the corridors.

 

  
  


Jack was left standing alone in the room. For a few moments he did not react, but then he moved over to a wall and laid his hand on it. “Did you abandon me too?” he murmured. “Or was it all him?”

 

The TARDIS hummed in his mind. It felt sorrowful. “Him then.”

 

Following a gentle pull in his mind, Jack walked along the corridor. He arrived at a familiar door. A lump formed in his throat. It was his room. Another nudge from the TARDIS, and he opened the door and walked in. It was just as he had left it. All his things, few though they were, were still there; his clothes, a technical manual, a semi-dismantled sonic blaster, and a book that Rose had insisted he read. 

 

He moved over to the bed, and laid the baby down gently. His first instinct was to lay down next to her, but then he remembered he could do other things. Looking down at himself, he realised for the first time that he was disgustingly filthy. But here, he could do something about it. He pushed open the bathroom door, to find a huge bath already filled with water. He was already naked, so he stepped straight in and sank down. 

 

* * * * 

 

Jack kept his composure while he bathed, but, when he walked back into the bedroom, he saw the baby lying on the bed. Why couldn't they have been rescued in time for her! His love and hate welled up, as strong as ever, in his mind. Love for the child that he had known so briefly, and hate for the being who had abandoned them. He clenched his fists, the need for vengeance so strong in him, that all he wanted in that moment was the Doctor here in the room with them. He pounded the wall with his hands, wishing that it was the Doctor that he was beating. When his rage subsided, he found himself leaning against the wall, which was covered in red smears. His hands were a mess. Pulling himself together, he went back into the bathroom and did what he could to sort his hands out. The TARDIS had dealt with the wall by the time he came out. 

 

He dressed in his 1940 clothes, which were hanging in the wardrobe where he had left them. Even his RAF coat was there. The one the Doctor had got for him, because his had been lost when the Chula ship blew up. Straightening his braces, he steeled himself. It was time to go look for his rescuer. 

 

* * * * * 

 

The Master was in the console room when Jack went back there. 

 

The Master looked at him, and appraised his new appearance. Jack was clean, and dressed in clothes that he must have found in the TARDIS; trousers, a blue shirt and braces. His hands looked newly bruised, however. “Better,” he pronounced, referring purely to Jack's new found cleanliness. He was somewhat nonplussed that Jack was still carrying the baby. 

 

“Wouldn't you like to find a place for the baby?” he asked eventually. 

 

“I promised her I wouldn't abandon her,” Jack stated defensively, holding the baby close to his chest. 

 

“And you didn't,” the Master assured him. “You have looked after her for centuries. But don't you think it's time now to find her a place to rest?” The Master knew he wouldn't ordinarily be this patient with a human, but the baby was of Gallefreyan heritage, and thereby worthy of respect. 

 

Jack looked mutinous. But one thing had caught his attention. Centuries, the Master had said. “What year is it?” he demanded. 

 

“200,406,” the Master informed him. “I know, from the scan I did of the baby, that you were there for centuries.” 

 

Jack was stunned. He had had no idea that much time had passed. 306 years!

 

“The TARDIS does not have the same dry conditions as that space station,” the Master pointed out, returning to the subject of the baby. “If you keep her here like this, her body will not remain so well preserved. I know a planet which specialises in arrangements for the dead. We could get a time stasis capsule for her. Then you could take your time deciding where you want to bury her.”

 

Jack still did not answer. 

 

“Which is your home planet, and what year? We could take her there,” the Master suggested. 

 

“I'm from the Boeshane Peninsula, in the 51st century,” Jack replied, finally. “But there's no one there I'd want to leave her with. The colony was destroyed.”

 

“What about Earth?” 

 

“No, I have no connections to Earth.”

 

The Master decided that, perhaps, discussing other matters, while the idea of a stasis capsule filtered through Jack's consciousness, might be a good idea. And there was a lot he wanted to know, starting with how a human ended up with the power of the vortex in them, and unable to die. When he had entered Jack's mind previously, he had not found that information before being sidetracked by the Doctor's memories. “Why don't you stay dead?” he asked bluntly. 

 

Jack laughed bitterly. “If I knew, don't you think I would have done something about it? I have spent years dying, and praying every time that it would be the end.”

 

“Knowing, and being able to do something about it, don't necessarily follow” the Master pointed out. 

 

“All I know is that I was exterminated by the Daleks, on that Satellite, and I woke up. Then I saw the TARDIS leave without me. The Doctor abandoned me, and in 300 years he never came back.”

 

That the Master did know. It had been clearly evident in Jack's mind. The idea of a Time Lord abandoning a human did not surprise, or trouble, him, lover or not. But the child was another matter. “Why would the Doctor leave someone who was carrying his child?” 

  
  


Jack's expression darkened. He had thought about that through the centuries, in his coherent moments. If the Doctor knew he was alive, and had left anyway, would it have made a difference if he had known? And, if it would have, what did that say about his value to the Doctor?

 

“He didn't know,” Jack replied. “I didn't find out myself until weeks after he'd left me.”

 

The Master was surprised at that. He had assumed that Jack was a long way along, when he was abandoned, and that the birth had taken place before the Satellite became uninhabitable. But, if what Jack was saying was true, it meant that the baby had survived, and grown, through the cycle of life and death that Jack had been caught in. That was astounding. And truly traumatic, for a human, he decided belatedly. In the circumstances, it was not surprising that the man was on the edge of insanity. Those memories must be part of the black morass that he had skimmed over. He should have realised, he mused. After all, the Doctor would never ask someone carrying his child to undertake a suicide mission, no matter how dire the circumstances. 

 

“Let's take the baby back to your room,” the Master suggested. “Then I want to join your mind again. I need to know exactly what happened to you, and what the Doctor did.”

 

“Do you think you can help me die?” Jack asked with hope in his eyes. “I've prayed for that for so long. Then I could be with her properly.”

 

“It might be possible,” the Master agreed, as they walked to Jack's room to leave the baby. “Come with me, and I'll see if I can tell what happened. We'll need to be relaxed, so come to my room.”

 

Jack followed the Master to his room. It was huge, compared to Jack's, and well appointed. There was a large bed, plush carpets and wall hangings. The Master gestured for Jack to lay on the bed, which he did without hesitation. After all, what did he have to fear. This was not the Doctor. This was the man who had saved him from hell. 

 

Laying beside Jack, the Master laid his fingers on his head. He moved into Jack's mind slowly. This time he would not skim the blackness. He needed to go back to just before the blackness started, and then move forwards. 

 

It took hours, but the Master persevered. He saw everything that happened after Jack set foot on the Satellite. He scoffed at Jack's devotion to the Doctor, that led him to go to what he knew would be his death. He felt Jack die and resurrect, only to discover that the man he loved more than life had abandoned him. And he saw all Jack's attempts to rationalise the abandonment. The Doctor thought he was dead. The Doctor had been kidnapped, or killed, and the TARDIS stolen. 

 

Then came the worst times. Jack had found out he was pregnant, and the air had run out. He died the first time, thinking it was the end, only to be cruelly resurrected to die again endlessly. Even the Master, who was not what anyone would consider sympathetic, could not help a pang of sorrow when Jack performed his own caesarian and touched the baby's mind for the last time. Through Jack, the Master also felt the mind of, what could be, the last Gallifreyan, as they died. By this time Jack's feelings for the Doctor had turned to pure hate.

 

When the Master let go of Jack, he slowly came back to himself. He was feeling a hate and anger towards the Doctor that mirrored Jack's own. He was also feeling Jack's desperation for touch and contact, and he responded with fervour. Within a minute of the Master disconnecting from Jack's mind, they were both naked and entwined. As they kissed the Master re-initiated the mind to mind contact, this time with a completely different motive. He did not search through any of Jack's memories, but channelled the physical sensations that he was feeling into Jack's mind. Jack reciprocated, in the same way that he had learned with the Doctor. 

 

This time their coupling was not frantic, and uncontrolled, but slow and sensual. The feelings each fed to the other multiplied together, to increase the sensations geometrically. Jack was well versed in Time Lord sexual physiology, and held nothing of his expertise back. They were both approaching the edge when the Master felt the time lines surround and cocoon them, and the energy swirl between them. It was glorious. With minds joined they were both swept up in it, the Master holding back his orgasm as long as he could, to prolong the experience. When Jack reached orgasm he could hold back no longer, and came harder than he had ever done before. They collapsed together on the bed, the time lines fading away gradually. Exhausted, they both fell into sleep. 

 

* * * * * 

 

When the Master woke, Jack was asleep next to him. It was practically unheard of for the Master to do this; to sleep with a lover after sex. And most definitely unheard of, with a non-Gallifreyan. But he had to admit that this had been the best sex of his life, not excluding the Doctor. It had become clear that it was Jack who caused the extraordinary effects that they experienced during sex, and was nothing to do with their previous proximity to the rift. He had theorised that the rift itself had caused it, before.

 

The Master looked at Jack carefully. For a human, he was extremely good looking. And he was unique: imbued with the vortex, undying, and spectacular in bed. The Doctor was crazy to have turned his back on this man. The vortex within him might be unnatural, and disconcerting when first encountered, but it enhanced so much that the minor discomfort was more than outweighed. 

 

There were two routes he could go. He could imprison the human, enslaving him, and forcing him to his will. There was no doubt that he could do that. The human's psyche was already badly damaged. It would not take much to break him. Or he could treat him as a lover, in fact genuinely become his lover, with all that that would entail. It had been centuries since the Master had done that, and he had never done so with a member of a lesser species. Was this mere human worthy of him? 


	5. Chapter 5

The Master chose option two. The human had transcended his species. He had even created a rift in spacetime; something the Master had eventually realised. With no Time Lords left, other than the Doctor, he was a worthy substitute. And Jack's hatred for the Doctor was not incompatible with the Master's own feelings. 

There was the little matter of Jack's sanity, or lack thereof. But many people had thought the Master insane, so who was he to judge. And what was a little insanity between friends? It would be interesting, if not easy. After fifty years of aimless wandering, bringing down the odd planetary government, the Master was bored, and the drums in his head were getting louder. He needed something to drown them out. He had been on the point of launching a major 'enslaving planets' initiative, purely for the lack of anything better to do. Interesting would be good. 

And, as for Jack's feelings on the matter, the Master was well aware that his main attraction for Jack was that he was not the Doctor. But he could work with that. The man was only too happy to engage in the physical aspect of a relationship. The rest would follow. 

With option one, slavery, he could physically force sex, but there would be a loss of the mind-to-mind passion. No one being coerced could make that work. He could invade the human's mind, but would never regain what they had experienced previously. 

Having made his decision, the Master threw himself wholeheartedly into making his new lover happy. And the first thing was to sort out the baby. 

* * * * * * 

A week later, the Master had talked Jack into visiting a stasis centre for the deceased. Together they had chosen a stasis capsule. It was white with gold filigree. The top was transparent, so the occupant could be seen. What they needed now was for Jack to decide about the baby's funeral. 

There was no immediate hurry for that, now that they had the capsule, so the Master waited patiently for Jack to be ready. In the meantime, they visited various pleasure planets, indulging in all they had to offer. 

Jack followed the Master's suggestions as to where they went, and what they did. He seemed to have lost the capacity to actively run his own life, after his experiences on the Satellite. 

They shagged their way across ten galaxies, before the Master realised that he hadn't even thought of planetary domination since becoming Jack's lover. And the drums were muted in his head. The more often he was exposed to the vortex in Jack, the fainter they became. 

On one night they lay together. The Master was more content than he had ever been. Jack leaned over to kiss him and started to speak. “ Master, I ...”

For the first time the Master did not like someone calling him that. It felt wrong. He was not Jack's Master, he was more than that. “My name is Koschei,” he stated softly, “call me that.”

Jack smiled and stroked his flanks. “Koschei,” he purred, trying it out. “Jack is not my original name,” he admitted.

“I know,” grinned Koschei, “but it's your name now, and that's what matters.” 

* * * * * 

All was not perfect however. Jack often fell into black moods, where he shut himself away and brooded, hugging the stasis capsule and talking to his baby. At these times his need for revenge resurfaced. He wanted to punish the Doctor for what he had done. 

Koschei, as he had promised, researched into Jack's condition. He was torn between wanting to help Jack and knowing that, if he succeeded, they would lose the spectacular effects that the vortex brought to their sexual interactions. Plus, Jack would no longer have a lifespan that could match his own. Despite that, he did his utmost to find a solution. He spent hours in the TARDIS's extensive library, trying to find any mention of another case like Jack's. There was an entire history of Gallifrey in the library, but he found nothing. He also did various tests on Jack, trying to draw the vortex out. The TARDIS refused to assist him for some reason. After six months he had to admit that there was nothing that he could do. 

* * * * * 

Jack did not take the news of Koschei's failure to find a cure well. Koschei had explained to him that he was a fixed point in time and space, and would never stay dead. It was an endless curse. He would live to the end of the Universe. 

“The Doctor did this to me,” he snarled. “He did this, and then ran away rather than face his guilt!”

Koschei wasn't so sure. He had no idea how the Doctor could have done such a thing. Running away was something he would have had no problem with, however. 

Jack was still ranting. “He murdered our daughter because of it, and I will never forgive him for that!”

Jack approached Koschei, and lifted his hands to his temples. “Make love to me,” he pleaded. “Look at all the time lines. I need to know if he ever saved us. Does she ever live?” 

Koschei had never tried to search for specific time lines before this, but he would give it his best shot. As he and Jack joined physically, and mentally, and soared through the time lines, he forced himself to ignore the pleasure in what they were doing and searched. There was the whole of time and space to search through, but he was a Time Lord and could zero in on the ones he was interested in. There were many strands branching off, but, as he sifted through them, it became clear that in most of them Jack was abandoned, and the baby died. In the others, Jack absorbed the power of the vortex, destroyed the Daleks, and burned. And he saw the events that led up to Jack becoming immortal.

* * * * * * 

The discovery that Rose had made him immortal, and that, in all the time lines Koschei had found, the Doctor always saved Rose, but never saved him, was devastating. It put Jack into a major depression. After brooding in his room for three days, he emerged and announced. “I want to take her to him. I want to show the Doctor what he did. He deserves to meet the daughter he murdered.”


	6. Chapter 6

Koschei was so pleased to have Jack make some sort of independent suggestion, as to what he wanted to do, that he would even have even agreed to take him to shopping to the largest Mall in the galaxy. But, as it was, confronting the Doctor was something he was quite keen to do. And, if he could not do it directly, he could do it by proxy via Jack. He would have to be careful with the time lines. When he had stolen the TARDIS on Malcassairo, the Doctor had not known that he had not been erased from time, along with Gallifrey at the end of the Time War. If they met a past version of the Doctor, he could not find out. It could jeopardise the events that led to him acquiring the TARDIS.

The TARDIS memory banks contained the information that they needed. They knew where and when Rose had gone when the Doctor tricked her into leaving Satellite 5, and where she and the Doctor had gone after she saved him. They followed. They landed on the Powell Estate only hours after Rose arrived for the first time. They had been careful not to land too close to the Doctor's TARDIS, but were instead hidden away in an alley on the other side of the flats.

Jack was on tenterhooks. “Let's go find her,” he demanded. He looked ready to head out of the TARDIS there and then. 

“Hold on now,” Koschei said calmly. “Remember that she mustn't see you. You were on that Satellite when she left it, and when she returned. You can't let her see you here, on Earth, before she rescues the Doctor. It could change her actions. It's not a good idea to get too close to her.”

However much Jack might want to change her actions, he knew that interfering with the time lines could bring the Reapers down on them. But he was still tempted. If Rose did not go back to save the Doctor, he would not be made immortal, and he and his daughter would not have to die endlessly on the Satellite. They would be permanently dead, a far better outcome. But he couldn't do it. It would create a paradox, which was far too risky. “Well what do you suggest then?” he asked, pushing temptation from his mind. 

“Why don't we watch her from here?” suggested Koschei. 

Jack was totally thrown. “From here? How the hell are we gonna do that?”

Koschei was actually surprised. “With the scanner of course,” he retorted impatiently. “Do you think these instruments are as primitive as human scanners? With the remote scanner, I can zero in on anything within a 5 mile radius. And someone who has travelled through the vortex shines like a beacon to the TARDIS.”

It took a few minutes, but Koschei did find Rose. Jack had never seen this feature of the scanners before, but it was incredibly useful. He wondered why the Doctor had never used it. They were able to watch, and hear, events occurring miles away, on the monitor screen. “I didn't know the scanner could do that,” he commented. 

Koschei laughed. “The Doctor was always a third rate excuse for an engineer. He probably didn't know either.”

Rose was with a woman, who could only be her mother, and Mickey, in a cafe. Jack and Koschei settled in to watch. Jack flinched when he heard Rose declame '200,000 years in the future he's dying and there's nothing I can do.' Shortly after, she ran out of the cafe, back to the TARDIS.

Koschei, seeing that Jack was upset, asked “What's the matter?”

“You heard what she said,” Jack answered, tersely. “She said 'he's dying', meaning the Doctor. She didn't say 'they're dying'. She doesn't give a damn about me. I'm irrelevant to her.”

They continued to watch, as Rose sat on a bench and sobbed. Mickey eventually joined her and they talked. Jack gasped as he saw them notice the graffiti. Bad Wolf. He remembered it from the Satellite. How the hell had it got here! It galvanised Rose. She sprang back into action. They watched in disbelief as Rose and Mickey fixed a chain to a Mini and took the other end into the TARDIS. They couldn't use the scanner to follow inside the other TARDIS, but that was a past event for this TARDIS, so all they needed to do was call up that time in her memory banks. They watched that on a different screen. 

Using the Mini didn't work, and they watched as Rose became despondent once more. She and her mother were sitting in the TARDIS. Rose was talking about what her father would expect. “Dad would say, if I could save the Doctor's life, try anything.”

Just the Doctor again, thought Koschei, glancing at Jack, who was studiously avoiding his gaze.

It seemed as if Rose had failed. Jackie left, leaving Rose behind, crying in the TARDIS. Rose had clearly given up hope of saving the Doctor. That changed when Jackie returned in a bright yellow tow truck. This time they succeeded. The TARDIS console opened and Rose absorbed the vortex. The doors slammed shut and the TARDIS dematerialised, leaving Jackie and Mickey standing on the, now empty, pavement.

The Master switched the screens off. He looked at Jack. 

“I thought it was just the Doctor who didn't care,” Jack said sadly. “But she didn't either. How could I have ever been stupid enough to believe that either of them loved me?”

Offering hugs and comfort was not in Koschei's repertoire, so he merely suggested that they get some sleep. “We know that Rose and the Doctor will return here, in the TARDIS, on Christmas Eve. So we'll move the TARDIS to that date when we wake, and see what they do,” he suggested.

“When he gets here, will he be able to feel the presence of this TARDIS?,” Jack asked. “Will he know that we are here?”

“No, he can feel her, but he won't be able to distinguish this one from his own. He's more likely to be able to feel you, if you get close,” Koschei advised. “So make sure that you want him to see you, before you go anywhere near him.”

* * * * * 

They moved forward in time to Christmas Eve, and waited for the Doctor to arrive. When he did, with the worst landing possible, he had his new face and collapsed in a heap in front of Mickey and Jackie. Rose emerged from the TARDIS a moment later. 

Clearly the Doctor was in the throes of regeneration sickness. Koschei explained that this could happen, but would sort itself out in a day or so. Jack could see that, at this point, the Doctor had not had a chance to go back for him on the Satellite. He could have forgiven the Doctor if he had left and then, when he was well, had come back. Why hadn't he? 

Things were pretty boring for a while, as all the Doctor did was lie in bed, being tended by Jackie and Rose. Every now and then he exhaled vortex energy. The Christmas tree spiced things up. Jack laughed out loud as it tore up Jackie's flat. The Doctor managed to wake up long enough to deal with it, but collapsed back into a coma again afterwards.

Things got even more interesting on Christmas day, when one third of the population went to stand on the edges of tall buildings. The Doctor was still in bed.

Rose, Jackie and Mickey took the unconscious Doctor into the TARDIS for safety, so Jack and Koschei called up the TARDIS memory banks again. Jackie was left behind as the TARDIS was taken by the aliens.

They couldn't follow the action on the spaceship, outside the TARDIS, as it was out of range. But, as usual, the Doctor saved the day. He, the TARDIS, Rose and Mickey, along with Harriet Jones and her aide, were deposited back at the Powell Estate. There was a bit of an altercation when the spaceship was shot down.

The Doctor then returned, with Rose and Mickey, to Jackie's flat. He even found time to change his clothes. 

This is it, Jack thought. The crisis is over. He's recovered, and they have free time. This is when the Doctor should go back for me. Whether he believes me alive or dead, he should still go back. 

But he didn't. There was no mention of Jack by the Doctor, or Rose. And Mickey, who should certainly have been aware that one of the crew was missing, never asked what had happened to him.

What they saw was a party, with a Christmas dinner of turkey, and all the trimmings. The Doctor and Rose were laughing, wearing party hats, pulling crackers, and having fun with Mickey and Jackie. They didn't appear to have a care in the world. 

They watched for an hour, intense fury rising up in Jack as time went on. “Tell me again how long this is, for them, after Rose rescued the Doctor from Satellite 5,” he snarled.

“Less than a day,” the Master informed him. 

“I see,” Jack forced out. “So, best case scenario, They think I died less than one day ago. Worst case scenario, they both abandoned me, on purpose, less than one day ago. But there's not a trace of sorrow or guilt in either of them.”

From what Koschei had learned from the time lines he had seen, there was a chance that Rose did not remember what had happened on the Satellite. But the Doctor; he had left Jack, whether knowing that he was alive or dead was unclear, but either way was a betrayal of someone who was meant to be a comrade, and an even worse betrayal of a lover.

After two hours of watching his 'friend' and his 'lover' celebrate, Jack couldn't stand it any more. He ran back to his room and pounded the wall in his agony. How could they not care! If the Doctor or Rose had died, he would have mourned them from the depths of his soul. He had thought they were his family. But he had been wrong. 

The hate that he had developed for the Doctor over the years of his abandonment on Satellite 5, took over again. He forced himself to be calm, and collected a few items from his room. He tucked them into his greatcoat. Then he gently lifted the stasis capsule. “It's time to go,” he explained to the baby. “You're going to meet your father.”

Koschei couldn't go with him, and his name must not be mentioned. He also thought that confronting the Doctor was something that Jack had to do alone. 

* * * * 

The doorbell rang. “I'll get it,” shouted Rose to her mother. She made her way to the door, giggling, tipsy after all the wine she had drunk. Jack stood at the door. Rose practically fainted with the shock. “Jack, how? I thought you were dead.”

Jack strode in, coat swishing around him, and looked around at the party. 

“So, are you having a good time?” he sneered. “I've been watching you. What is it, Rose, 24 hours since you thought I died? I'm glad to see that you've got over any grief so quickly.” He looked her straight in the eyes. “How long did you mourn me? A couple of hours? Ten minutes?”

Rose blanched. She had been so wrapped up in making sure that the Doctor was safe, that she hadn't given Jack a second thought. 

Jack read it on her face. Physical pain prickled through him. “Ah, not even that. After all, the important people were fine,” he mused softly to himself. “And it would be simple to get a replacement for me, if you even wanted to bother.”

He turned to the Doctor then, who was standing at the far end of the room, like a deer caught in the headlights. “But maybe you didn't need to mourn, did you Doctor? Did you know that I was alive on that Satellite, when you abandoned me? In fact , did you know that I'd stay alive no matter what?”

Rose gasped. “How can you say that, Jack? Of course he didn't know. We would never have left you if we'd known.”

Jack had a good view of the Doctor's face when Rose stated that. He could see the guilt etched into his features. Rose was looking at Jack and missed it. 

The vain hope that Jack had been holding on to died. So, worst case scenario for the Doctor then. He held out the white box to the Doctor. “This is for you.”

The Doctor took it gingerly and looked inside. He gasped in horror. In it was a baby, long dead, and wrapped in white cloth. 

“Meet your daughter, Doctor. Her whole existence was agony and torment, thanks to you.”

Something gripped the Doctor's chest as he gazed into the casket. It was a combination of horror, guilt and grief. It did not for a moment occur to him to doubt Jack's word. As he looked at the pitiful creature he bit back a sob. Another Gallifreyan. His daughter. It would have been a dream come true. He felt sick. 

“You were pregnant,” he whispered, more to himself than to Jack. “Why didn't you tell me?”

Rose was totally confused. “I don't understand,” she interjected, addressing the Doctor. “If this is your daughter, who is the mother?” 

The Doctor looked at her bleakly. “You don't have to be a woman to have a baby where Jack's from.”

Rose was stunned. “So, this baby, she's yours and Jack's?” she stuttered in disbelief.

The Doctor stroked the capsule gently, his heart breaking. “I'm so sorry,” he murmured. “I never meant for this.” He turned to Jack. “Jack, I'm sorry. I would never have left you if I had known you were pregnant.”

And with those words the doctor condemned himself, even to Rose.

“But you did leave us,” Jack snarled. “And I couldn't find a way off. We waited weeks for you to come. And then the power failed, and the oxygen ran out.”

The bitterness and hate in Jack's voice and demeanour was palpable. Menace, and barely suppressed violence, radiated from him. Rose involuntarily took a step back. The Doctor held his ground. 

“You had your vortex manipulator,” he argued. “I thought that you would be able to go anywhere you wanted.”

Jack moved over to the Doctor then, and grabbed his hair, pulling his head back. The Doctor did not resist. “My VM didn't survive the Dalek blast, so it was useless. And you can guess what happened next can't you Doctor? You understand. She died with me every time. Can you imagine it Doctor? An infant, suffocating every 15 minutes in the womb. And, when she was born, I prayed that the immortality would pass over to her. I prayed for that, even though I knew it would torture her until we were rescued, if we ever were. But it didn't. She lived for about two minutes, Doctor, and I got to hold her, and she was beautiful.” Jack was crying by this point. 

Rose was listening to their exchange in horrified fascination. She didn't understand all of what Jack was talking about, but what she did get was appalling. 

Jackie and Mickey were even more confused, but they knew that Jack was accusing the Doctor of something terrible. And he wasn't denying it.

The Doctor understood perfectly. He now knew exactly what he had condemned Jack and their daughter to, and he realised how much they had suffered. His mind recoiled from it. He had deliberately betrayed Jack, knowing that the other man would be devastated. But he had never thought that this would be the result. Even without the presence of the baby, Jack would have suffered intolerably. There was no justification that he could give, but he tried to explain. “I didn't want to leave you,” he cried. “I loved you, but you were wrong, an abomination, not meant to exist. I couldn't bear to be near you. I can feel you now. It's ...” he trailed off. 

Jack's heart, already fractured so badly, turned to stone at the Doctor's words. Forcing back his tears he managed to speak “He can see the time lines you know; when we make love. He can see all that could have been, and what still might be. And, in all those myriad time lines, he's never seen one where you save us. If I become immortal, you always abandon us. If I make Rose immortal, you let us burn, and take her with you. So don't tell me you loved me. I know what I meant to you.” 

Jack ignored the look of total confusion on the Doctor's face, as he talked about Koschei. “Well, this is what you mean to me,” he hissed. “You left us to die. In over 300 years you did not come back. You murdered our daughter. My only feelings towards you now are hate, and have been for three centuries.”

The words 300 years, pierced the Doctor's soul. He could hardly blame Jack for hating him. 

Moving towards the Doctor, a feral look in his eye, Jack pulled out a wicked looking knife. “I owe you 10,000 deaths, Doctor. This is just the first.” As he spoke, he plunged the knife into the Doctor's stomach, and yanked it upwards. “This isn't going to be enough Doctor. Watch your back. You never know when I will be there, ready to take the next one, and it won't be quick next time.” He caressed the back of the Doctor's neck with his free hand, in a parody of a lover's touch. Moving his mouth close to the Doctor's ear, he whispered. “I have all of time to choose from. And the only thing I regret is that you have so few lives that I can take.”

The others present had been taken by surprise by Jack's action, and had not moved in time to prevent it. Rose and Jackie screamed in horror, and Rose rushed to the Doctor's side, as Jack dropped him to the ground. She pressed on the wound, shouting for Mickey to help her get the Doctor to the TARDIS. But it was clearly hopeless.

Jack focussed on her once more. “Why did you do it Rose?” The agony in his voice was all too evident. “Why resurrect me? I clearly wasn't important to you. And you have left me with this curse to the end of the universe.”

From her position on the floor next to the Doctor, Rose looked up at him with total incomprehension, and Jack realised that she had no idea what she had done. 

As he swept out of the room, Jack had just one parting message. “Say goodbye to your daughter, Doctor. You won't see her again.” Those left behind were too busy trying to help the Doctor, to stop him leaving.

* * * * * 

After Jack had left the Doctor, Koschei kept the scanner on the scene in Jackie's flat. Jack had done a good job with the knife. They had discussed the finer points of Time Lord physiology, as relevant to fatal knife wounds. It had done a lot of damage, and death would be slow in coming, but was inevitable, even for a Time Lord. 

After several minutes, Jack returned. The Doctor was reaching the end. 

“Happy regeneration day, Doctor,” Koschei murmured, as they watched him explode into light.

* * * * * 

They went to Woman Wept. This planet held happy memories for Jack; of the time when he and the Doctor and Rose had been a family. He had wanted to bury his daughter somewhere with some connection to her father. And it was beautiful. He and Koschei chose a mountain peak, covered in ice and snow. The glaciers below it gleamed in the sun. Nothing here would ever be disturbed. 

Koschei used his laser screwdriver to gouge out a grave in the ice, below a massive boulder. They laid the baby to rest, still in the stasis capsule. He then etched out, on the boulder, the words that Jack had chosen.

Sha'hiri   
Child of Earth and Gallifrey  
Beloved Daughter  
Never Forgotten

They had chosen the name together. Sha'hiri in Gallifreyan meant beautiful and loved. 

Jack knelt by the grave, and touched the words on the boulder. The encounter with the Doctor had been cathartic. He would always remember, but he was ready now to let go. “I can never be with you, but I'll come back and see you,” he promised.

He stood as Koschei laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Are you ready to go?”

Jack nodded. He followed Koschei down to the TARDIS. 

“Where would you like to go?” Koschei asked.

“I know a great bar on Beta Cassiopeia 3,” Jack suggested. “And they have a museum there with a really fine Arkanian death mask. It would look great in the TARDIS.”

Koschei laughed. “So, petty larceny eh? Isn't that a bit beneath you?”

“It's hardly petty,” Jack exclaimed. “It's worth the combined wealth of ten planets. Anyway, we've done enough pleasure planets, for now at least. Do you have any better ideas?”

“The Doctor would not approve.”

“Well, I've learned how much my becoming a 'good citizen' gained his approval,” Jack sneered. “I think I can live without it.”

Koschei grinned. “After that we could visit this planet I know of. Very superstitious natives. They thought I was a god. Or there's this planet that's just asking to be dominated,” he added with a nefarious expression. 

Jack looked intrigued. “Could be interesting,” he commented. 

“But we don't need to decide yet,” Koschei added. “It's been a long, and emotional day. Come to bed, sleep. There's no hurry to do anything.”

* * * * 

Hours later, Koschei lay in bed, watching Jack sleep. It was ironic, he mused, that Jack had effectively ensured that the Doctor would not go back for him. Now that the Doctor had seen Jack after he was abandoned, he would be crossing his own time line if he went back for him on the Satellite. It could be a self fulfilling causal loop. The Doctor did not come, therefore Jack went back for his revenge, therefore the Doctor did not come. Of course that supposed that the Doctor would ever have got around to it, if Jack had not done this. He couldn't help but suspect that the Doctor would not have done so. 

When Jack woke, they made love. Koschei looked at the possibilities again. He had been right. If he had not rescued Jack, and hence Jack had not gone after the Doctor, Jack would have remained on the Satellite until its orbit decayed and it burnt up in Earth's atmosphere. He would then have resurrected and been trapped on an Earth still incapable of space flight. The Doctor would never have gone back for him. 

The outcome had been tragic, but now they both had an opportunity for a better life. They were both damaged – he by the drums, Jack by the Doctor's abandonment. But it seemed that, together, they could help each other. He had avoided looking into their future; some things were better not known, but he hoped that they would have many years together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just the epilogue to go now.


	7. Epilogue

In the control room on Malcassairo, the Doctor and Martha lay on the hard floor. They had been there for four days. The Doctor had succeeded too well in locking the door against the Futurekind. The mechanism had jammed solid, and, even when the vicious cannibals had left, he and Martha had been trapped inside the room. There was no food or water. 

 

The Doctor was in despair. He cursed the Master for stealing the TARDIS, and abandoning them to die. He knew that he could last for a quite a long time without sustenance, but Martha was another matter. She was fading fast, the lack of water taking a dreadful toll. Her lips were horribly cracked, and she was only semi conscious at best. Within a day she would be dead. 

If only they could get out of this room! There was water in the complex, and possibly food as well. Getting to it would give them time to figure out a way to get off Malcassairo. The complex was full of scientific equipment that had been left behind when the humans headed for Utopia. With that, the Doctor was sure that he could eventually find a way to get them to a more civilised time and place. 

The sonic screwdriver had failed to open the door, so the Doctor had resorted to more primitive methods. In desperation, he lifted the crowbar he had made from a table leg once again, and put all his strength into trying to force the door open. As he applied the maximum force, the crowbar slipped and hit him hard on the arm. He cried out in pain. The door stayed stubbornly closed. 

* * * * 

An hour later, the sound of the TARDIS materialising filled the room. The Doctor stared in amazement as he saw it return. Leaping up he cried, “Yes! Thank you Master!”

The TARDIS door opened and the Master emerged. He was pointing a gun at the Doctor. “Back up,” he ordered. 

The Doctor did as he was told. His jaw dropped in shock as Jack followed the Master out of the TARDIS. Remembering, in excruciating detail, his last encounter with Jack, even though it had been decades in the past, the Doctor backed up as far as he could, fear in his eyes. “Jack!” The confusing aspects of their conversation in London suddenly fell into place. The Master was the one Jack had talked about. The Master was Jack's lover. 

Jack looked him over coldly, taking in the Doctor's new appearance. He had not got a good look at the regenerated Doctor, after he had killed him in London. This Doctor was skinny, with a prominent jaw; not nearly as good looking as the previous one. And the bow tie was certainly an unusual fashion statement. He looked over to the Doctor's companion, who had not moved. His expression changed from cold contempt to compassion. He moved over to her and gently turned her over. 

The Doctor started to move towards them, but was forced back by the Master's gun. 

“She's dying,” Jack told Koschei. 

“OK, bring her in to the TARDIS,” Koschei instructed. 

“What are you going to do with her?” the Doctor cried in alarm, as Jack lifted Martha and carried her into the TARDIS.

“Save her life,” the Master informed him. “Can you believe it?” he asked, gesturing to himself. “Me, part of the bleeding heart brigade. We're here to rescue a damsel in distress.”

The Doctor looked unconvinced.

“Your ex-companion is a very bad influence,” the Master continued. “Do you know that I haven't killed anyone since I met him twenty years ago.”

The Doctor looked pointedly at the gun the Master was currently aiming at him.

“What, this?” the Master asked. “It's a stun gun. To make sure that you don't do anything; like try to steal the TARDIS back, and leave us stranded here.”

“I don't trust you,” declared the Doctor. “You are evil, and that will never change. And Jack would do anything to hurt me. And, if you are genuine, why did it take twenty years to get around to a rescue?”

“Oh, I'm not an angel,” the Master agreed, “and neither is Jack. We have had a fun couple of decades since you saw him last. The TARDIS now has many new art exhibits; very rare and precious.” He smiled as he remembered the fun they had had acquiring the items. 

“But you're wrong about Jack. Yes, he wants to hurt you, and that will never change, but he wouldn't hurt someone else to do that. When he realised that I'd abandoned both of you at the end of the Universe, he got worried. For some reason he thought that you might be about to let another companion die. He insisted that we come back here to get her, and take her home. And, as for the twenty years; I never told him the details of how I acquired the TARDIS before that. We were busy,” he added with a laugh.

At that moment, Jack emerged from the TARDIS. “I've put her in the medical bay, with an IV to get fluids into her,” he told Koschei. “Time to go.”

Jack's actions mollified the Doctor. He finally believed that Jack and the Master meant Martha no harm. Heartfelt relief flooded him. She would live. He wouldn't be responsible for yet another companion's death.

The Master gave Jack a smile. The Doctor was stunned at the look that passed between them. He knew the Master, intimately, and that look spoke volumes. Jack was not just a convenient shag, the Master actually loved him. And, judging by the way Jack had returned the look, he felt the same. He could remember a time when Jack had directed that look at him. Shame filled him. After what he did, he could hardly blame Jack for hating him now.

As the Master and Jack turned to go back into the TARDIS, the Doctor started to follow. He was brought up short as the Master raised the gun once more, saying, “Ah, ah. Not you.”

Jack looked contemptuously at the Doctor. “Do you really think that I would rescue you, Doctor?” he said, voice dripping scorn. “You stay here.”

“But you can't leave me here!” the Doctor protested. “I can't even get out of this room. I'll die here, permanently, if you leave me here.”

Jack smirked. “You make that sound like a bad thing,” he pointed out callously. “But, you and I have a few more appointments. I wouldn't want you to waste your deaths on this.” He went back into the TARDIS, and came out a few minutes later with a vicious looking gun. He aimed at the door to the room, and pressed the trigger. The door vanished. “There you are,” Jack said. “Now you can get out of the room. It's up to you to get yourself off Malcassairo.” 

“Jack,” the Doctor called, as the Master and Jack turned to go back into the TARDIS. “I would have gone back for you. I would have, if our time lines hadn't crossed.” After Jack showed him their daughter, and stabbed him, the Doctor had spent many hours analysing his intentions when he abandoned Jack. He had admitted to himself that, when Jack had gatecrashed the Christmas party, he had not had the slightest intention of ever going back. But that would have changed, he was sure. Once the trauma of regeneration, and the crisis had passed, and things had returned to normal, he would have reconsidered. Wouldn't he?

 

Jack gave him a look of utter hatred. “I don't believe you,” he snarled. “Remember, we can see all the time lines. I don't cross your time line in many of them.” With that, Jack strode to the TARDIS, fuming. The Master followed him, giving the Doctor a cheery wave. “Watch out for the Futurekind,” he shouted, just before the TARDIS door closed behind him and dematerialisation began. 

* * * * 

Martha was asleep when they checked on her. But it was a healthy sleep, rather than unconsciousness. It was likely that she would sleep for several hours. Jack set an alarm to alert them if she woke, and checked that the IV would last for a few hours. Then, he and Koschei retired to bed. Sleep was not immediately on their agenda, however. Even after twenty years together, their physical relationship was as dynamic as ever. 

As they lay together afterwards, Koschei asked, “Any regrets?” 

“What about?” Jack queried. 

“Saving Martha, and not rescuing the Doctor,” Koschei clarified. 

“None at all,” Jack responded, leaning in for a kiss. “Have you?”

“No. He's very resourceful. He'll get away from Malcassairo. I'm sure we'll cross paths again.”

“I'm amazed that he couldn't get out of that room,” Jack commented with a laugh. “It was stuffed full of equipment.”

“Sometimes it's the trivial details that cause the problems,” Koschei noted with amusement.

“Maybe in a century or so we can hunt him down again,” Jack mused. 

“And what shall we do in the meantime?” Koschei asked. 

“Well, we'll take Martha home first. And after that the Universe is waiting. I'm sure we'll think of something,” Jack replied with a delighted grin. 

 

End


End file.
